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Maxwell and the Rings of Saturn
newsletter OF THE James Clerk Maxwell Foundation Issue No.5 Spring 2 015 Maxwell a nd t he Rings of Saturn by Professor Andrew Whitaker, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Queen’s University, Belfast Le Verrier, or to be worthy of the credit bestowed on him by Britain and, in particular, Cambridge. The funds for the Adams Prize were A view of the rings of Saturn (from Gribbin, John and provided by alumni of Adams’ Cambridge Goodwin, Simon (1998). Empire of the Sun: Planets college, St. John’s, and the prize was in and Moons of the Solar System. Constable, London.) the gift of the University. Airy and Challis were heavily involved in choosing topics Maxwell considered the rings of Saturn Against this background, why was in the first few years of the prize, and in to be ‘ the most remarkable bodies in the Maxwell prepared to put in so much work Maxwell’s year William Thomson was heavens ’, second only, in his opinion, to over several years on the rings of Saturn? also an examiner. Thomson, later Lord the spiral nebulae. Yet it seems extremely Admittedly the prize was substantial – Kelvin, had, of course, been Professor of unlikely that he would have devoted £130, or perhaps £13,000 in today’s terms, Natural Philosophy at Glasgow University a substantial amount of time and and this was rather more than a third of since 1846, but retained very strong links effort to determining their structure his full year’s salary at Aberdeen. But it is with Cambridge throughout his career. mathematically had the topic not been more likely that the reasons for taking Thus the institution of the Adams Prize chosen in 1855 as the subject of the on the challenge were, firstly, personal and the quality of the prize-winning Adams Prize of 1856. -
James Clerk Maxwell
James Clerk Maxwell JAMES CLERK MAXWELL Perspectives on his Life and Work Edited by raymond flood mark mccartney and andrew whitaker 3 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries c Oxford University Press 2014 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted First Edition published in 2014 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2013942195 ISBN 978–0–19–966437–5 Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. -
New Force at Large Distances
New force at large distances Daniel Grumiller Institute for Theoretical Physics Vienna University of Technology TEDx Vienna, November 2010 I What are the fundamental forces in Nature? I What is the nature of space, time and matter? Some questions physics cannot address: We live in the golden age of fundamental physics Goal: want to understand how the Universe works Some questions physics can address: I What is the Universe made of? (picture by NASA) D. Grumiller | New force 2/11 I What is the nature of space, time and matter? Some questions physics cannot address: We live in the golden age of fundamental physics Goal: want to understand how the Universe works Some questions physics can address: I What is the Universe made of? I What are the fundamental forces in Nature? (picture by lifesbalancebeam) D. Grumiller | New force 2/11 Some questions physics cannot address: We live in the golden age of fundamental physics Goal: want to understand how the Universe works Some questions physics can address: I What is the Universe made of? I What are the fundamental forces in Nature? I What is the nature of space, time and matter? (picture by spacescan.org) D. Grumiller | New force 2/11 We live in the golden age of fundamental physics Goal: want to understand how the Universe works Some questions physics can address: I What is the Universe made of? I What are the fundamental forces in Nature? I What is the nature of space, time and matter? Some questions physics cannot address: D. Grumiller | New force 2/11 What is the Universe made of? D. -
Recent News 28,270 MILES - WAY to GO!
Number 62 Spring 2017 TREASURE HUNT – 16 Where is this bridge (hint: it is not in the UK) and who designed it? Can you see the parabola and its tangent? Recent News 28,270 MILES - WAY TO GO! In October last year a record was set for the longest single road route ever worked out. The Travelling Salesperson Problem (TSP) was first posed in the 1930’s by Merrill Flood who was looking to solve a school bus routing problem in the US and it asks the following question: "Given a list of cities and the distances between each pair of cities, what is the shortest possible route that visits each city exactly once and returns to the origin city?" This is an example of an optimisation problem and is of immense importance to businesses who need to make deliveries to many places as the shortest route between the warehouse and drop off points generally means considerable saving in time and money. The TSP also has applications in computing DNA sequences, aiming telescopes and designing computer chip circuits. William Cook and a team of researchers at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada calculated a round route that starts in Portland, Dorset and finishes in Weymouth, four miles away has at least 100 times more stops than the previous longest TSP. It links 24,727 hostelries in the UK. EDITORIAL SQUARE NUMBERS Welcome back to a new term and a new year! We In SYMmetryplus 61, Autumn 2016, modular arithmetic congratulate Mathematical Pie for their 200th edition was used to find a prime factor of 283 1. -
The Mystery and Majesty
The mystery and majesty Nearly 40 years after THE SPACE AGE BLASTED off when the Soviet Union launched the Voyager 2 visited Uranus world’s first artificial satellite in 1957. Since then, humanity has explored our cosmic and Neptune, scientists are backyard with vigor — and yet two planets have fallen to the planetary probe wayside. eager for new expeditions. In the 63 years since Sputnik, humanity has only visited Neptune and Uranus once BY JOEL DAVIS — when Voyager 2 flew past Uranus in January 1986 and Neptune in August 1989 40 ASTRONOMY • DECEMBER 2020 of the ICE GIANTS — and even that wasn’t entirely pre- interstellar mission, more than a dozen pro- In 1781, Uranus became the first planet planned. The unmitigated success of posals have been offered for return missions ever discovered using a telescope. Nearly 200 years later, Voyager 2 Voyager 1 and 2 on their original mission to one or both ice giants. So far, none have became the first spacecraft to visit to explore Jupiter and Saturn earned the made it past the proposal stage due to lack Uranus and Neptune, in 1986 and 1989 respectively. NASA/JPL twin spacecrafts further missions in our of substantial scientific interest. Effectively, solar system and beyond, with Neptune and the planetary research community has been Uranus acting as the last stops on a Grand giving the ice giants the cold shoulder. Tour of the outer solar system. But recently, exoplanet data began In the 31 years since Voyager 2 left the revealing the abundance of icy exoplanets Neptune system in 1989 and began its in our galaxy “and new questions about WWW.ASTRONOMY.COM 41 With a rotation axis tilted more than 90 degrees compared to its orbital plane, Neptune likewise has a highly tilted rotation axis and tilted magnetic axis. -
“The Cloud of Unseeing”: Myths Transformed and Pseudo-Scientific
Journal of Tolkien Research Volume 6 | Issue 2 Article 4 2018 “The loudC of Unseeing”: Myths Transformed and Pseudo-scientific nI terpretations of the Book of Genesis Kristine Larsen Central Connecticut State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch Part of the Biblical Studies Commons Recommended Citation Larsen, Kristine (2018) "“The loudC of Unseeing”: Myths Transformed and Pseudo-scientific nI terpretations of the Book of Genesis," Journal of Tolkien Research: Vol. 6 : Iss. 2 , Article 4. Available at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol6/iss2/4 This Conference Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Library Services at ValpoScholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Tolkien Research by an authorized administrator of ValpoScholar. For more information, please contact a ValpoScholar staff member at [email protected]. Larsen: “The Cloud of Unseeing” 1 Note: This paper was delivered at the Tolkien Seminar, Kalamazoo, MI, on May 9, 2018. The referenced handout is reproduced as an appendix at the end. As more than one astute reader of The Silmarillion has mused, how could life – especially plant life – exist in Middle-earth before the creation of the Sun and Moon? After all, in those early days in Arda after the destruction of the Two Lamps, the Two Trees – the progenitors of the Sun and Moon – only lit the Blessed Lands. Tolkien himself was troubled by these scientific inconsistencies, going back at least as far as 1948. That year he loaned to Katherine Farrer a copy of a radical, experimental version of his creation myth termed by Christopher Ainulindalë C* (called the “Round World Version” by Tolkien) (MR 39). -
ADAMS's UNPUBLISHED PAPERS. the Scientific Papers of John Couch Adams, Vol. II. Part I., Extracts from Unpublished Manuscripts, Edited by E
272 ADAMS'S UNPUBLISHED PAPERS. [March, ADAMS'S UNPUBLISHED PAPERS. The Scientific Papers of John Couch Adams, Vol. II. Part I., Extracts from Unpublished Manuscripts, edited by E. A. SAMPSON. Part II., Terrestrial Magnetism, edited by W. G. ADAMS. Cambridge, Pitt Press, 1900. 4to. xxxii + 646 pp., with 6 magnetic charts. Lectures on the Lunar Theory. By JOHN COUCH ADAMS, edited by R. A. SAMPSON. Cambridge, Pitt Press, 1900. 8vo. 88 pp. BY those who knew John Couch Adams best the exami nation of the manuscripts which he left and the publication of a selection from them has been looked forward to with much interest. His well known reluctance to publish any thing not in a complete form—"I have some finishing touches to put to it77—raised hopes that valuable results might be contained in the packets of neatly-written and dated papers which were turned over after his death for examination. It was known that he had been at work on various problems, in particular on that most difficult one— the theory of Jupiter's satellites, and on the theory of ter restrial magnetism. It was known, too, that Adams rarely attacked a problem without throwing a new light upon it or evolving some unexpected result. He had not fallen into the modern habit of making " preliminary communications,'' or, at least, if these were made they were verbal and did not find their way into print. Thus the publication of this volume was looked forward to with greater expectation than is usual in the case of other scientists who have lived to his age. -
Neptune: from Grand Discovery to a World Revealed Essays on the 200Th Anniversary of the Birth of John Couch Adams
springer.com Physics : Astronomy, Observations and Techniques Sheehan, W., Bell, T.E., Kennett, C., Smith, R. (Eds.) Neptune: From Grand Discovery to a World Revealed Essays on the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of John Couch Adams A major reassessment of the discovery of Neptune from a pan-European perspective Written by a distinguished team of extensively published researchers Provides new analysis and theoretical insights into the original discovery of Neptune Springer The 1846 discovery of Neptune is one of the most remarkable stories in the history of science and astronomy. John Couch Adams and U.J. Le Verrier both investigated anomalies in the 1st ed. 2021, XXXI, 403 p. 1st motion of Uranus and independently predicted the existence and location of this new planet. 130 illus., 71 illus. in color. edition However, interpretations of the events surrounding this discovery have long been mired in controversy. Who first predicted the new planet? Was the discovery just a lucky fluke? The ensuing storm engaged astronomers across Europe and the United States. Written by an Printed book international group of authors, this pathbreaking volume explores in unprecedented depth the Hardcover contentious history of Neptune’s discovery, drawing on newly discovered documents and re- examining the historical record. In so doing, we gain new understanding of the actions of key Printed book individuals and sharper insights into the pressures acting on them. The discovery of Neptune Hardcover was a captivating mathematical moment and was widely regarded at the time as the greatest ISBN 978-3-030-54217-7 triumph of Newton’s theory of universal gravitation. -
The Contrivance of Neptune Downloaded from by DESY-Zentralbibliothek User on 27 November 2019
NEPTUNE The contrivance of Neptune Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/57/5/5.28/2738843 by DESY-Zentralbibliothek user on 27 November 2019 Davor Krajnović looks back 170 mid-19th century was, however, very dif- ferent from now. State observatories were years to the planetary discovery not research institutes in the present sense, that startled the world – an but primarily factories producing useful interplay of scientific triumph data, from time-keeping to charting the and human weakness. skies. The use of the observatory tele- scopes was at the discretion of the director and, as an assistant, Galle “ e planète, dont vous avez had to ask for permission to observe signalé la position, réellement for his own private research. Lexiste.” This is the opening The director of the Berlin sentence of an extraordinary letter Observatory, Encke, was aware sent by Johann Gottfried Galle from of Le Verrier’s theory that a more the Berlin Observatory to Jean Joseph distant planet perturbs the motion Urbain Le Verrier on 25 September of Uranus, and did not think much 1846: “The planet whose position you of it. But when Galle approached him predicted really exists.” One can only with the letter, he agreed that it presented imagine the emotions of Galle while a “moral commitment” to Galle to look writing it, or those of Le Verrier reading for the planet. The standard story (e.g. it three days later in Paris. This sentence Turner 1911, Grosser 1962, Standage 2000) announced the most remarkable confir- 1 This 2002 Hubble image of Neptune shows it in is that Encke reluctantly gave permission mation of a theoretical prediction in the detail unimaginable to the 19th-century scientists to Galle to observe that night, but Galle’s history of science. -
John Couch Adams: Mathematical Astronomer, College Friend Of
John Couch Adams: mathematical astronomer, rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org college friend of George Gabriel Stokes and promotor Research of women in astronomy Davor Krajnovic´1 Article submitted to journal 1Leibniz-Institut für Astrophysik Potsdam (AIP), An der Sternwarte 16, D-14482 Potsdam, Germany Subject Areas: xxxxx, xxxxx, xxxx John Couch Adams predicted the location of Neptune in the sky, calculated the expectation of the change in Keywords: the mean motion of the Moon due to the Earth’s pull, xxxx, xxxx, xxxx and determined the origin and the orbit of the Leonids meteor shower which had puzzled astronomers for almost a thousand years. With his achievements Author for correspondence: Adams can be compared with his good friend George Davor Krajnovic´ Stokes. Not only were they born in the same year, e-mail: [email protected] but were also both senior wranglers, received the Smith’s Prizes and Copley medals, lived, thought and researched at Pembroke College, and shared an appreciation of Newton. On the other hand, Adams’ prediction of Neptune’s location had absolutely no influence on its discovery in Berlin. His lunar theory did not offer a physical explanation for the Moon’s motion. The origin of the Leonids was explained by others before him. Adams refused a knighthood and an appointment as Astronomer Royal. He was reluctant and slow to publish, but loved to derive the values of logarithms to 263 decimal places. The maths and calculations at which he so excelled mark one of the high points of celestial mechanics, but are rarely taught nowadays in undergraduate courses. -
The Search for Planet X Transcript
The Search for Planet X Transcript Date: Thursday, 22 October 2009 - 12:00AM Location: Museum of London The Search for Planet X Professor Ian Morison The Hunt for Planet X This is a story that spanned over 200 years: from the discovery that Uranus was not following its predicted orbit and was thus presumably being perturbed by another, as yet undiscovered planet, Neptune, followed by the search for what Percival Lowell called "Planet X" that would lie beyond Neptune (where X means unknown), and finally the search for a tenth planet beyond Pluto (where X means ten as well). As we shall see, the search for a tenth planet effectively ended in August 2006 when Pluto was demoted from its status as a planet and the number of planets in the solar system was reduced to eight. Uranus Uranus was the first planet to have been discovered in modern times and though, at magnitude ~5.5, it is just visible to the unaided eye without a telescope it would have been impossible to show that it was a planet rather than a star, save for its slow motion across the heavens. Even when telescopes had come into use, their relatively poor optics meant that it was charted as a star many times before it was recognised as a planet by William Herschel in 1781. William Herschel had come to England from Hanover in Germany where his father, Isaac, was an oboist in the band of the Hanoverian Foot Guards. As well as giving his third child, Freidrich Wilhelm Herschel, a thorough grounding in music he gave him an interest in the heavens. -
Library Catalogue 2000, by Author
A B C D E F G H I J 1 alastname afirstname title dewey_ydoeuwtey_nudmewey_ldeetwey_nopteublisher year notes 2 AAAS "The Moon Issue" of Science, Jan 30/1970 523.34 S 1970 3 AAVSO Variable Comments 523.84 A Cambridge: AAVSO 1941 4 Abbe Cleveland Short Memoirs on Meteorological Subjects 551.5 A Washington: Govt Printing Office1878 5 Abbot Charles G. The Earth and the Stars 523 A Copy 1 New York: Van Nostrand 1925 6 Abbot Charles G. The Sun 523.7 A Copy 2 New York: Appleton 1929 7 Abell George O. Exploration of the Universe 523 A 3rd ed. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winst1o9n75 8 Abercromby Ralph & Goldie Weather 551.55 A London: Kegan Paul 1934 9 Abetti Giorgio Solar Research 523.7 A New York: MacMillan 1963 Abetti, Giorgio 1882-. 173p. illus 21cm (A survey of astronomy) 10 Abetti Giorgio The History of Astronomy 520.9 A New York: Henry Schuman 1952 Abetti, Giorgio, 1882- 11 Abetti Giorgio The Sun 523.7 A Copy 2 London: Faber and Faber 1957 Abetti, Giorgio 1882-. Translated by J.B. Sidgwick 12 Abro A. The Evolution of Scientific Thought From Newton to Einstein 530.1 A New York: Dover Publications 1950 481p. ports,diagrs 21cm. No label on spine. 13 Achelis Elisabeth The World Calendar 529.5 A New York: G.P. Putnum's sons 1937 Achelis, Elisabeth, 1880-. The world calendar; addresses and occasional papers chronologically arranged on the progress of calendar reform since 1930. 189p. pl.,double tab. 21cm "Explanatory notes" on slip inserted before p.13. 14 Adams John Couch The Scientific Papers of John Couch Adams, Vol.